Anthony is held under the Sedition Act for his speech at the Pakatan Harapan Convention the previous Saturday calling for the toppling of the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak.

Let me make it very clear that the DAP and Pakatan Harapan is committed to the toppling of the Prime Minister, Datuk Najib Razak and the UMNO/Barisan Nasiuonal government for making Malaysia a “global kleptocracy”, but by constitutional means through the democratic process by the ballot box and not in any violent, unconstitutional or revolutionary manner. Read the rest of this entry »

During the final winding-up of the 2017 Budget debate yesterday, I asked the Second Finance Minister, Datuk Johari Abdul Ghani whether and how the three former Cabinet Ministers, MP for Pagoh and former Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, MP for Semporna and former Rural and Regional Development Minister, Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal and the MP for Tambun and former Second Finance Minister, Datuk Seri Abdul Husni Hanadzlah had violated Cabinet secrecy when they took part in the debate in Parliament on the budget.

Johari was unable to give a cogent and intelligible answer.

I in fact asked Johari why he dared not repeat inside Parliament what he had earlier said outside the Parliament chamber, that it was not wrong for MPs and former Cabinet Ministers like Husni to ask questions about 1MDB in Parliament.

There was no answer from Johari.

Although the Second Finance Minister, the Minister tasked with the final reply on the 2017 Budget speech, does not know that the three former Cabinet Ministers had violated Cabinet secrecy, the Speaker Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia seemed to know more about Cabinet secrets about the 1MDB than Johari with his media conference statement on Thursday, 27th October that the three former Cabinet Ministers might have broken their oaths of secrecy when debating the 2017 Budget.

This has shocked many lawyers and law professors, as well as the former longest-serving Attorney-General, Tan Sri Abu Talib Othman, who was AG for 13 years from 1980-1993, who expressed surprise and questioned how the Dewan Rakyat Speaker knew that three former ministers had revealed government secrets when they raised the 1MDB issue during budget debate.

Abu Talib wondered how Pandikar, as head of the legislature, knew that the Cabinet had discussed the 1MDB issue. Also, how did he know what was discussed was classified information.

Abu Talib asked whether somebody had told the Speaker about it, and if so, Speaker should have lodged a police report against that very person who told him.

However, this most important question is whether Pandikar had committed a crime under section 124(B) of Penal Code of an activity “detrimental to parliamentary democracy” when he egged on police investigations of three former Cabinet Ministers for their speeches on 1MDB in Parliament – especially as the police seemed to be using Section 124(B) against all and sundry, including university students and peaceful critics of the government-of-the-day! Read the rest of this entry »

Former Cabinet Minister Tan Sri Sanusi Junid has confirmed that he will attend with former Prime Minister Tun Mahathir Mohamad the meeting in Parliament on Tuesday of Members of Parliament (including former MPs and Ministers) to discuss the country’s latest constitutional crisis on the doctrine of separation of powers and how to defend Parliament and MPs’ parliamentary privileges and immunities against insidious police encroachments.

Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar said yesterday that “3 ex-ministers under probe over 1MDB statements”(New Straits Times 5/11/06 headline p. 10) and this is most shocking for two reasons:

Firstly, when did the police have free roving liberty to investigate speeches by MPs (whether former Minister or not) made in Parliament, as if MPs’s traditional and constitutionally-entrenched parliamentary privileges spelt out in Article 63 (2) of the Malaysian Constitution and the Houses of Parliament (Privileges and Powers) Act 1952 do not exist in the eyes of the IGP.

Should MPs submit their speeches to the police for approval before they are delivered in Parliament. Is this what Malaysia has become, in the eighth year of premiership of Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak?

Secondly, is the IGP through his arbitrary and unconstitutional action sending out a message that 1MDB issue is a “banned” subject in Parliament, as MPs who raised the issue of 1MDB in Parliament could be next in line of police’s interrogation when the three ex-Cabinet Ministers could be targeted by the police for speaking in Parliament on 1MDB?

Khalid’s statement yesterday has laid bare the frightening and even Kafkaesque nature of the constitutional crisis on the doctrine of separation of powers among the Executive, Legislature and Judiciary which has been suddenly sprung on the nation when he said that the police had enough reasons to investigate former Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, former Rural and Regional Development Minister, Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal and former Second Finance Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Husni Hanadzlah as there was no immunity from seditious statements in Parliament. Read the rest of this entry »

Overnight, Malaysia is faced with a major constitutional crisis with the gravest threat in the nation’s history on the proper place and power of Parliament in our system of governance and the traditional as well as constitutionally-entrenched parliamentary privileges and immunities of Members of Parliament, regardless whether from the government or the opposition.

Central to this constitutional crisis facing Malaysia is whether the Speaker, Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia, is capable of leading MPs to fend off the Executive and Police threats to parliamentary privileges and immunities by arbitrary, unconstitutional and illegal assumption of non-existing powers against Parliament?

The latest incident in the insidious subversion of Parliament’s proper role and place in the Malaysian system of governance, based on the doctrine of separation of powers among the Executive, the Legislature and the Judiciary, is the shocking announcement by the Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar that the police are now investigating former Second Finance Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Husni Hanadzlah for sedition over his speech in Parliament about 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), aside for alleged violations of the Official Secrets Act (OSA) 1972.

The Inspector-General of Police made the nonsensical statement that Husni’s case is also classified under the Sedition Act because the investigation into the state investment firm was still underway and that talking about it might jeopardise the process.

He said: “Even in Parliament, it doesn’t give an MP the immunity against the Sedition Act to speak about such matter(s).” Read the rest of this entry »

Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia, who had been the eighth Speaker of Dewan Rakyat, should have known of the famous parliamentary episode in the United Kingdom some four hundreds years ago on 4th January 1642 when King Charles I entered the House of Commons to arrest five Members of Parliament for high treason.

When the King asked the Speaker at the time, William Lenthall, if he knew of the location of these members, the Speaker famously replied:” “May it please your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak in this place but as the House is pleased to direct me, whose servant I am here; and humbly beg your Majesty’s pardon that I cannot give any other answer than this to what your Majesty is pleased to demand of me.”

I am not suggesting that Pandikar should emulate William Lenthall and be prepared to sacrifice his political career let alone his life to protect Parliamentary honours, privileges and immunity, but I stand corrected if he is not the only Speaker in the world to openly suggest – or to use the words of Tun Mahathir’s lawyer, Haniff Khaliri, “incite” – police reports or police action against Members of Parliament when he called a media conference last Thursday to suggest that the three former Cabinet Ministers, former Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, the former Rural and Regional Development, Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal and the Second Finance Minister, Datuk Husni Hanadzlan might have broken their oaths of secrecy as Cabinet Ministers when debating the Budget 2017 in Parliament – which was as good as a public reprimand of the Attorney-General and the Inspector-General for dereliction of duty and instigation for them to act against Muhyhiddin, Shafie and Husni.

I have re-read the speeches of Muhyiddin, Shafie and Husni in the Parliament Hansard, which confirm that neither one of them had said anything during their speeches in the 2017 Budget debate to reveal any Cabinet secret which Malaysians and the world have not known before about the 1MDB financial scandal. Read the rest of this entry »

The Speaker, Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia should retract his media conference statement last Thursday that the three former Cabinet Ministers, former Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Mujhyiddin Yassin, former Rural and Regional Development Minister, Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal and the former Second Finance Minister Datuk Seri Husni Hanadzlah might have broken their oaths of secrecy as Cabinet Ministers when debating the Budget 2017 in Parliament, as it was such ill-advised and unfortunate statement by the Speaker which triggered off a chain of deplorable events – like the baseless police reports lodged by busybody-NGOs, the Malaysian Malay Network Organisation (JMN) and Kuala Lumpur Federal Territory N87 Club, and police action to investigate the three former Cabinet Ministers.

If the Speaker had not made the ill-advised and improper statement at last Thursday’s media conference, it would not have triggered off this chain of unfortunate and deplorable incidents.

Pandikar should accompany the retraction with a bold and clear-cut statement reaffirming the traditional parliamentary principle that MPs enjoy parliamentary privileges and immunity and the police should not challenge the parliamentary privileges of Members of Parliament except in clear-cut cases provided by the Constitution. Read the rest of this entry »

For over four decades, the Members of Parliament in Sabah and Sarawak had been taken for granted by the UMNO/Barisan Nasional Federal Government, regarded as useful “cannon fodder” to make up the numbers to ensure UMNO’s increasing hegemony in the Federal Government but not critically important, as the ruling coalition had always won with two-thirds majority in Parliament.

The political landscape and electoral equation began to change in the 12th General Election in 2008, when the UMNO/Barisan Nasional Federal coalition government lost its two-thirds parliamentary majority for the first time in Malaysian history.

But the 57 Parliamentary seats from Sabah and Sarawak became critically important only in the 13th General Election in 2013, when the 47 Barisan Nasional MPs saved the UMNO/BN coalition from going to the opposition ranks.

This was because the UMNO/BN coalition only won 86 parliamentary seats in Peninsular Malaysia, which was not enough on its own to constitute the simple majority out of a Parliament of 222 seats to form the Federal Government in Putrajaya.

It was only with the 47 Parliamentary seats won by the UMNO/BN coalition in Sabah and Sarawak that Datuk Seri Najib Razak could continue as Prime Minister with 133 parliamentary seats, though as the first minority Prime Minister of Malaysia as UMNO/BN coalition only won minority popular support of 47% of the national voter turnout.

The 47 Barisan Nasional MPs from Sabah and Sarawak were therefore the kingmakers of the UMNO/Barisan Nasional Federal Government after the 13th General Election in 2013, but unfortunately, they have so far failed to exercise their proper influence, role and input on national policy direction and developments.

Without the support of the 47 Barisan Nasional MPs from Sabah and Sarawak, Najib’s Federal Government in Putrajaya will fail and fall. Read the rest of this entry »

MCA Ministers led by the MCA President Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai must have thought that they are very smart and clever in finding a way to get “insurance” to remain in the Cabinet for as long as possible by equivocating on PAS President Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang’s private member’s bill motion.

MCA leaders have been going round the country declaring that MCA Ministers will relinquish their Cabinet posts if Hadi’s private member’s bill is passed.

This is begging the question as MCA Ministers are completely avoiding the issue which may come up in the first week of Parliament beginning on Monday as to whether Hadi’s private member’s bill motion will be debated and passed by simple majority vote.

Will MCA Ministers declare that they will relinquish their Cabinet posts if Hadi’s private member’s bill motion is passed in Parliament either next week or the last week of Parliament from Nov. 21 – 24?

And if not, why not?

This applies to the Ministers from Gerakan, MIC and other Sabah/Sarawak Barisan Nasional component parties.

By making an artificial distinction between Hadi’s private member’s bill motion and Hadi’s private member’s bill, MCA Ministers hope to get “insurance” to cowardly and cravenly hang on to the Cabinet for as long as possible – relying on Standing Order 49(3), (4) and (5) to argue that although Hadi’s private member’s bill motion had been passed in Parliament, Hadi’s private member’s bill had not yet been passed. Read the rest of this entry »

There are six possible scenarios as to what could happen to the PAS President Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang’s private member’s bill motion in the 25-day Budget Parliament beginning on Monday, viz:

1. Hadi’s private member’s bill motion comes up for debate in the first week of Parliament, whether on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday and passed with simple majority support.

2. Hadi’s private member’s bill motion debated in the first week of Parliament and rejected with simple majority vote.

3. Hadi’s private member’s bill motion not debated in the first week of Parliament and deferred until after the 2017 Budget’s debate and passage in the last week of Parliamentary meeting from Nov. 21-24.

I am quite perplexed by the statements which the MCA President and the MCA Transport Minister, Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai, had been making in the past two days about the possibility of Hadi’s private member’s bill motion coming up for debate and vote in next week’s Parliament. Read the rest of this entry »

I visited Parliament to collect the Parliamentary Order Paper for the 25-day budget meeting of Parliament from Oct. 17 to 24th November, and I find the parliamentary business planned most surprising and even shocking.

Firstly, will there be a tectonic shift of the fundamental basis of the Merdeka Constitution 1957 and Malaysia Agreement 1963 next week in Parliament if the PAS President Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang’s private member’s bill is passed?

Hadi’s private member’s is slated as the fourth item of parliamentary business after a motion by the Youth and Sports Minister, Khairy Jamaluddin to congratulate the Malaysian Olympians and Para-Olympians for their sterling performances in the two recent world sporting events; the Advocates (Sabah) (Amendment) Bill 2016 and a Treasury motion to convert a RM500 million loan to Small Medium Enterprise Development Bank Malaysia Berhad (SME Bank) to equity.

Under the circumstances, the possibility that Hadi’s private member’s bill motion will come up for debate and voting either on Tuesday, or even on Monday, cannot be ruled out. Read the rest of this entry »

An UMNO-owned mainstream media reported today that PAS President, Datuk Seri A Abdul Hadi Awang’s hudud-enabling private member’s bill would be tabled and debated in Parliament next week.
In the circumstances, the continued silence of the Presidents of MCA, Gerakan, MIC and Sabah and Sarawak component parties of Barisan Nasional on whether they have agreed on a Barisan Nasional consensus for Hadi’s private member’s bill to be given priority over official business in the budget meeting of Parliament to be debated and voted upon is no more tenable.

The time has come for all the Barisan Nasional component parties to break their silence on Hadi’s private member’s bill.

Early this month, the UMNO and Barisan Nasional secretary-general Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor said that BN has arrived at a consensus regarding Hadi’s private member’s bill. Read the rest of this entry »

What is most significant about the “policy” statements the MCA and Gerakan Presidents at their respective MCA Johor State Convention and the Gerakan national delegates’ conference today is not what they said but what they did not say.

MCA President Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai brushed off the possibility of a “one to one” fight between the Opposition and the Barisan Nasional in the next national general elections as “empty talk” although this is a prospect MCA leaders fear most – not that they are comfortable with other political scenarios in the 14GE to make MCA more than a “7/11” political party.

Gerakan President Datuk Seri Mah Siew Keong struck a “holier than thou” stance and railed against former Prime Minister, Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad for “dabbling in unhealthy politics” with the statement that the Barisan Nasional government in three states of Perak, Terengganu and Johor could fall before the general election as a small change in state assemblymen could topple the BN state governments.

Mah suffered from an early case of amnesia when he said that a change in the top leadership and administration of a state could only be determined by a process of democracy via an election, and not by getting elected representatives to switch camp or entice them to defect – forgetting how Barisan Nasional toppled the Pakatan Rakyat state government in Perak under Datuk Seri Nizar Jamaluddin as Mentri Besar in February 2009 by engineering a defection PR State Assembly members.

But what is more important is not their verbal gymnastics but their silence on the claim by the UMNO and Barisan Nasional secretary-general Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor that BN has arrived at a consensus regarding PAS President Abdul Hadi Awang’s private members bill.

AMANAH Deputy President, Sallehudin Ayub reported that AMANAH has 85,000 members on its first anniversary.

I congratulate Parti AMANAH on its success, for DAP can only boast of having 85,000 members after a decade of political struggle.

Today is a special day for BERSIH 5 launched off its Nov. 19 campaign with publicity convoys from six places in Malaysia – Johor Baru, Lumut, Kangar, Kota Baru, Sandakan and Miri.

The BERSIH 5 campaign for clean, free and fair elections is even more pertinent than in the four previous four BERSIH campaigns, as the proposed redelineation of electoral constituencies have demonstrated that we have an electoral system which is utterly rotten and corrupt to the core.

The Election Commission had violated the constitutional mandate as laid down in the Thirteenth Schedule of the Constitution which stipulates that in any constituency redelineation, “the number of electors within each constituency in a State ought to be approximately equal except that, having regard to the greater difficulty of reaching electors in the country districts and the other disadvantages facing rural constituencies, a measure of weightage for area ought to be given to such constituencies”, but have instead done the exact opposite – widening the disparity between the largest and smallest electorates in both parliamentary and state assembly constituencies.

The Election Commission was not only acting against the Thirteenth Schedule of the Constitution, but was working with a political agenda to gerrymander the constit uency redelineation so that in Parliament, it an achieve the twin objectives of returning UMNO-BN to power in Putrajaya and with a two-thirds parliamentary majority; while at the State Assembly level, ensure that UMNO-BN can win back Selangor state power and ensure that UMNO-BN maintain the state government in both Perak and Kedah, and even secure a two-thirds state assembly majority in Perak. Read the rest of this entry »

Together with three DAP MPs, Teresa Kok (Seputeh), Zairil Khir Johari (Bukit Bendera) and Steven Sim (Bukit Mertajam), we made a five-day visit to Jakarta and Jogjarkata to meet with leaders of political parties and Islamic organisations as well as public intellectuals to understand the development of Islam and democracy, and the dangers of Islamic extremism, in a country with the largest Muslim population of some 220 million out of a national population of 250 million people.

One thing that struck us during the discussions we had during our visit in Jakarta and Jogjarkarta was the central place of Pancasila among the major Indonesian political and intellectual leaders in the nation-building process in the country, as compared to Malaysia, where the “establishment” political and intellectual leaders have virtually forgotten about the Malaysian counterpart to Pancasila, the Rukun Negara!

Leaders of the two largest Muslim organisations in Indonesia, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) and Muhammadiyah, have no qualms in publicly stating, whether in private discussions or public forums, that their commitment to Pancasila was an important reason why the Islamic State concept was not suitable or appropriate for Indonesia, although it has the largest number of Muslims for any country in the world!

How many Malaysian political and intellectual leaders in the country are still committed to the five principles of Rukunegara, viz:

• Belief in God.
• Loyalty to King and Country.
• Upholding the Constitution.
• Rule of Law.
• Good Behaviour and morality. Read the rest of this entry »

According to its Constitution, Malaysia has to hold its next general election by Aug 24, 2018. That is still almost two years away. And yet, rumours of early elections persist, both at the state and federal levels.

This needs some explaining, given how Prime Minister Najib Razak waited until almost the last minute to go to the polls back in 2013.

The exercise to delineate constituency boundaries now being concluded heightens speculation that early polls are coming. Having lost its two-third majority since 2008, the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) has not been able to increase the number of parliamentary constituencies; it is now able only to realign the existing ones – or rename them. And that, it is doing.

That in itself is a substantive exercise of power, especially with the independence of the Election Commission that is in charge of the delineation being in serious doubt. Read the rest of this entry »

Nobody is impressed with the Barisan Nasional Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor’s announcement that the Barisan Nasional Supreme Council will meet on Friday to discuss the Election Commission’s (EC) proposed redelineation exercise.

This is because the Barisan Nasional Supreme Council has degenerated from the Barisan Nasional Federal coalition government’s highest decision-making body into a superfluous and even superannuated creature without any bite, role, authority or purpose whatsoever.

It has followed the footsteps of the Cabinet to become an utterly toothless, purposeless and irrelevant body.

Despite protestations and denials by the EC Chairman, Datuk Mohd Hashim Abdullah that the constituency redelineation exercise was being carried out for the benefit of certain parties, nobody believes that the Election Commission would dare to propose the most unconstitutional, blatant and flagrant constituency redelineation proposals – the most undemocratic of all five redelineation exercises in the nation’s history – without “greenlight” from the highest “political strategists” in the corridors of power in Putrajaya (which do not include anyone from outside UMNO)!

Mohd Hashim’s protestation and denials lack credibility or conviction, for the EC Chairman is unable to explain why he had jettisoned his predecessor, Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof’s previous redelineation plan to abide by the Constitution and the democratic principle of “one man, one vote” by ensuring that there will be no super-size parliamentary constituencies exceeding 100,000 votes. Read the rest of this entry »

The DAP MP for Serdang, Dr. Ong Kian Ming’s repartee to the denial by the Election Commission Chairman, Datuk Mohd Hashim Abdullah that the constituency redelineation exercise is being carried out for the benefit of certain parties is a gem: “Yeah right, and I’m sure that Jho Low had nothing to do with 1MDB either…”

Can Mohd Hashim explain why he had jettisoned his precedessor, Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusof’s redelineation plan to abide by the Constitution and the democratic principle of “one man, one vote” by ensuring that there will be no super-size parliamentary constituencies exceeding 100,000 votes?

Abdul Aziz had gone on public record to say that in the new constituency redelineation to be proposed by the Election Commission, “a constituency with a large number of votes, more than 100,000, has to be divided into two, so that the constituents could obtain good service from the elected representatives”.

Why did Mohd Hashim abandon this important Constitutional and democratic principle in the final proposal of the Election Commission for the redelineation of electoral constituencies?

This was because the Election Commission’s constituency redelineation proposals, made public on the eve of the 53rd Malaysia Day, was not only undemocratic in violating the “one man, one vote, one value” principle, but clearly against the 1Malaysia policy to create a nation where every Malaysian perceives himself or herself as Malaysian first and race, religion or region second.

Let the Election Commission Chairman, Datuk Seri Mohd Hashim Abdullah explain whether the constituency redelineation proposals had been inspired by the 1Malaysia policy to promote a nation where every Malaysian regards himself or herself as Malaysia first or will in effect exacerbate racial polarisation and consciousness, and undermine national unity, in the country.

Furthermore, let him answer critiques that the new redelineation proposals are in fact more undemocratic than previous redelineations in violating the democratic principle of “one man, one vote, one value”. Read the rest of this entry »

The onus is on the Election Commission to prove that it is not gerrymandering the current constituency redelineation exercise as in the past to keep UMNO in power.

There are two reasons why the Election Commission shoulders such an onus.

Firstly, the public admission or confession at the end of 2013 by the former longest-serving Secretary and later Chairman of the Election Commission, Tan Sri Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman, who managed six of the 13 general elections and responsible for three of the four electoral constituency redelineations in Malaysia that he had gerrymandered the redelineations to ensure that the Malays remain in power.

Secondly, preliminary study of the current redelineation exercise indicate that it is driven by the overall agenda to keep UMNO in power and to eliminate Opposition leaders in vulnerable seats from Parliament, like Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin in Pagoh and Nurul Izzah Anwar in Lembah Pantai than to comply with the democratic and constitutional principle of “one man, one vote, one value” and to establish that the Election Commission is transparent, independent and professional not beholden to the dictates of the government of the day. Read the rest of this entry »

I call on the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak to convene a special Parliament meeting before National Day on August 31 to debate the burning issues in the country, including Najib’s RM55 billion 1MDB and RM4.2 billion “donation” twin global scandals, the National Security Council (NSC) Act and the worsening racial/religious polarisation in the country highlighted by the Pahang mufti’s incendiary “kafir harbi” statement.

Parliament adjourned on May 26 and is next scheduled to reconvene on Oct. 17 – a recess of some five months.

In an era of fast-changing developments, especially with many burning national issues crying out for answers and solutions, it is the height of irresponsibility for Parliament to adjourn for as long as some five months and this is why Najib should convene a special meeting of Parliament before National Day on August 31, where the two newly-elected MPs from Sungai Besar and Kuala Kangsar can officially take their oath of office.